Women's Sexual Problems questionnaire

For example, figures put about saying that a "majority" of women suffer from some form of "female sexual dysfunction" is surely contradictory - if it's a majority of women, then surely it's not "dysfunctional" or "abnormal", but it's actually the norm. And so on. The medicalisation of women's sexual issues in order to create a wonder drug means that other, non-medical treatments (such as therapy) are being disguarded because the problems will no longer be treated as psychological, which the vast majority of them are.

My friend's thesis will argue both sides using qualitative research based on these questionnaires.

And you're right to suggest this may skew people's answers, again it's just my interpretation and should have no bearing whatsoever on any input, however I thought some qualifying statement was necessary to give an angle on why I thought this research was important.

Plus, this questionnaire is being put to a very widest cross section of the public possible, not just the wacky hipsters who frequent this board - I just thought posting on here was a good way of reaching a certain "demographic" who would not necessarily frequent the places or read the publications where my friend is advertising the research.

that's for sure! (sorry)

"Oh yeah, so if I lick your nipples you DON'T GET WET AT ALL??? HAAAAAWTTT!"

(xpost MARKELBY IN FRIGIDITY-CHASER SHOCKAH!!!)

Umbrella term for anything from vaginismus to loss of desire to inability to orgasm to, well, anything which deviates from the "normal" sexual experience, i.e. a construct which doesn't actually exist anyway.

This is the point - "Female Sexual Dysfunction" as a disorder (it's got an acronym, it MUST be real) doesn't generally exist as a disorder.

It's like those ads on the Tube - "Do you suffer from Daily Fatigue? Take this shit, feel good" - as though "Daily Fatigue" is an actual medical syndrome, which is clearly bollocks.

It's so easy to say, then - I'm not enjoying sex as much as I think I should be, and oh look it says here I have this disorder, which means it MUST be real, which means I'm not normal, which means I'll buy the first drug that comes along to "cure" me.

I could go on - ADD, schizophrenia, all kinds of medicalised constructs. But you get the gism.

xpost

Schizophrenia is a classic example - it doesn't exist as an "illness" in the same way that, say influenza or meningitis does.

What it really is is an umbrella term for a variety of symptoms, not even necessarily related, which for the sake of the medical model (i.e. the dominant theoretical model) have been consolidated into one monthly payment.

Therefore "schizophrenics" (a more outrageous misnomer is harder to find) are lumped together, locked away and drugged up, because what "illness" is not treatable by drugs?

By treating it as a purely biological illness (for which there is scant scientific evidence), it ignores facts such as the much higher prevalence of schizophrenia amongst ethnic minority communities.

And so on. It's a very complex argument that maybe I'm not so good at articulating!

Schizophrenia is a classic example - it doesn't exist as an "illness" in the same way that, say influenza or meningitis does

this can be read in two ways of course. saying that schizophrenia is a 'social construct' is great and radical of course; but simultaneously you are wishing away a phenomenon in the world whic hcauses misery to sufferers and their loved ones. the 'anti-psychiatry' thing is pitiless in this respect: it doesn't just refuse answers, it says none are possible.

Not true. Schizophrenia does have physically measurable symptoms. You can do a brain scan on a schizophrenic and it will be different in specific ways to that of a non-schizophrenic.

http://www.schizophrenia.com/schizpictures.html

Whether you can effectively treat schizophrenia is another issue.

Exactly, efficacy is another issue - my point is that psychiatry wants us to believe this is the only possible way forward.

Also, many of these symptons are unrelated, many of which those diasgnosed with schizophrenia do not actually suffer from - (I don't remember exactly how many symptoms are accepted as being related schizophrenic, but I think it was around 180?)

This is a great book.

look, no-one ever said that language provides a one-to-one correspondence system, that word is thing.

The physical symptoms which you describe are one thing - isn't the the actual lumping together of these the construct?

Well, not really, no, any more than other names applied to physical phenomena are 'constructs', such as 'indiction' or 'gravity'.

A construct on which the medical model, and therefore drug companies, and therefore society, persuades us there is a single treatable "illness"?

aha! yes, medical science is untrustworthy because beholden to capital. there's a lot of truth in this, but it doesn't mean that therapeutics are either simply a matter of evil power games or a dangerous illusion.

and as it goes 'the medical model' (like there's one) is quite aware that schizophrenia is very very difficult to 'treat'; i'm not sure who is saying it's simple.

by putting 'illness' in scare quotes what exactly are you saying about people who suffer from this 'coincidence of symptoms'?

I was depressed, plain and simple - but I saw first hand how the system failed me, in that various things I said and did were taken out of context and shoehorned into this classification of "psychosis". I tried to laugh it off as they duly took notes about my "strange" clothes, my daily experiences, my jokes etc and ticked off their list, and I spent most of the time arguing - no, debating - with them as to the merits of their actions. i.e. I was certain that my "issues" were psychological, NOT biological. Magnesium supplements were not going to cure me, neither was a regular pottery class.

Naturally, the more drugs they put me on (I still have a list of all 12 I tried - Hal0p3rid0l does very very nasty things to both your eyesight and your genitals) knocked me out so much I could no longer protest as hard. But when I started to refuse any more treatment I was threatened with sectioning, so off I went to the institution. (A few days later I did a "deal" to get out, but that's another story).

Essentially, there was nothing psychotic about me at all - I suffered no hallucinations, auditory or otherwise. And I told them this. I was no more a danger to myself or society that your grandmother. But other symptoms fitted, so nuts I was.

I realise this is a slightly extreme case - however, if I could be failed by the system, how many other people who perhaps were not as articulate as me at expressing their needs and concerns, and without the support network I had (although I didn't tell anyone, I knew I could have had the support had I really needed it) are being mistreated in this way?

Perhaps if they had listened to me first, and I had undergone some actual therapy to try and understand the issues I was facing before stamping me with this "illness", then things could have been very different.

Ironically, the suffering of being labelled like this, coupled with the extraordinary side effects of the drugs, plus the stigma for years after, were all far far worse that whatever the problem was in the first place.

Not recommended. C-.

What are scare quotes?

Sorry, I see now how my comments could be misinterpreted in this way - I didn't mean it to sound so conspiracy theorist!

Essentially what I mean by "people in power" etc is "the norm", i.e. that standard by which society runs at any given time (be that bourgeois, capitalist or whatever).

So there's a median (not individuals) which exploits and contains those who do not fit into that norm - that's natural animalistic behaviour, surely?

This wasn't meant to be some withering and half arsed attack on "the man".

sounds more like what should be the new login name for a certain ilxor from tufnell park.

Precisely my opposite hope / intention: Medicalising and framing symptoms in an easy-take-home label, then drugging them to their skulls clearly doesn't help people who need help.

I'm all for medical approach, of course - if it works. However a deconstructionist approach is essential for deciding on ways to treat all of these problems, ADHD and depression included.

Or shall we just continue to drug everyone who we can't deal with - while those nice drug companies dream up even more ways to meddle with the DSM for their own ends?

aahem i.e. all girls who have sex in any way other than the missionary position can take this questionnaire.

But yeah, what society does with schizophrenics and how it treats them and whether they're treatable and what effects the drugs have are all indeed social responses to a very real and not constructed phenomenon.